Movies vs. History

Originally posted on 24 Feb 2008


I’ve recently strayed from my usual reading material which has always been science fiction or fantasy mass market paperbacks to nonfiction, more specifically historical nonfiction. Last summer I found out that my great-great grandfather on my mom’s side fought in the Civil War with the 155th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry. That led me to read a locally published book online about the 155th, where I found out they were on Little Round Top during the Battle of Gettysburg. They had mostly a reserve roll, but still, that’s pretty cool and besides, I love that movie and own it on DVD.

I still needed more so I got Gettysburg by Steven W. Sears. Outstanding book, that I recommend to anyone interested in the subject. Very easy to read and written in a narrative/action sort of way that is very exciting (don’t give me any grief about the review, I’m not book critic), especially during the battle sequences, but keeping all the appropriate quotes and citations that a history book should have.

The movie “Gettysburg” is based off the book The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara which is a historical novel that I have not read but I plan to. From what I have read, I think they did a pretty good job with the historical accuracy of the movie version and all in all a movie viewer could get a correct although narrow slice of that significant battle.

Don’t worry; I’m getting to the point…

One of my all-time, absolute favorite cowboy movies is “Tombstone” starring Kurt Russell and Val Kilmer. So, my ever vigilant wife, seeing my shift to nonfiction, gave me Doc Holliday: The Life and Legend by Gary L. Roberts for my birthday. Another outstanding book with the only drawback that I noticed is that Roberts kind of expects you to know a little about Holliday to begin with. At least it is written with that slant.

Well that’s fine by me, I say. I’ve seen “Tombstone” at least a dozen times, but here in lies my problem and the reason I started this rant in the first place. The farther I got in the book the more I noticed that “Tombstone” takes a hell of a lot of liberties with the plot. Where “Gettysburg” is almost entirely fact based, “Tombstone”, apparently in an effort to make the movie more exciting leaves a lot out and what is included is jumbled around in the timeline to make the Earp brothers the clear protagonists and the Cow Boys the clear antagonists.

Hey, it’s just a movie you say. Well, that’s all well and good except a lot of people don’t read and take what they see as true in a movie based off true events. I read somewhere that “Wyatt Earp” staring Kevin Costner was a more accurate portrayal of the events, but it only looks that way because of the way it is filmed. It’s even farther off point. “Tombstone” at least included real scenes like Wyatt pulling John Tyler out of the Oriental by the ear, which actually happened, although not under those circumstances and not at that time. I think “Tombstone” was viewed as the campier movie because it had cool one-liners like the “…you called down the thunder…” line.

Now I’m only including two movies in this little bitch session, but this same thing could go for most if not all movies. When I found out “Fargo” was entirely made up, I felt like I was cheated on.

If it was up to me, which it is certainly not, but it should be, all movies based off true events where the names of the characters are not changed from their real life historical counterparts, should be totally and with out a doubt true to fact. Since I realize this is not completely possible, a rating system should be employed based off the percentage of historical accuracy and should be listed with the MPAA rating. For example:

“Gettysburg” rated PG; 98% True
“Tombstone” rated R; 50% True
“Fire in the Sky” rated PG-13; 0% True; unless you are an uber-nerd in which case 100% True

Let us keep in mind the real victims in all this, the poor high school or college students who are way too busy to study for their history exams, so they just watch the movie.
Won’t somebody think of the children?